Earthquake-hit Japan and many other rich nations are reaffirming pledges to give $US30 billion from 2010-12 to help poor nations fight climate change despite budget cuts.

Climate aid has totalled $US16.2 billion since January 2010, according to submissions to the United Nations by a May deadline. Poor nations have said much of the cash is from existing programmes and is not new as promised. Donors were led by Japan, the European Union and the United States.

"Aid is definitely coming through the pipeline," said Liz Gallagher, an expert at the E3G environmental think-tank in London

You may remember that the mega size money transfer deal (100 billion USD a year by 2020) was brokered by president Obama and other leaders at the Copenhagen climate conference in 2009 as a "compensation" for not being able to agree on anything else. It was one of the most weird - and expensive - pledges in recent years, particularly when one knows that many of the "rich" donors are living on borrowed money. In spite of all this, these same leaders now continue pledging the money they do not have for fighting something that does not exist. Fortunately, much of the money seems to be coming from "existing programmes". Still, the whole thing is an enormous waste of taxpayers´ money.